Mapping service what3words can give your address to three metres’ accuracy using just three words. This sounds like a great idea-but, in practice, it’s more of a global.positioning.fail…
For anyone wondering, all of the what3words addresses used in the video are real, and shown in their actual positions. For example, you can find global.positioning.fail in North Dakota (as shown in the thumbnail if you look closely!) what3words.com/global.positio...
Video chapters
00:00 Introduction
01:47 The maths of what3words
03:28 1 - uses.confusing.language
04:30 2 - means.confusing.addresses
07:00 3 - offends.people.easily
10:23 4 - overlooks.vertical.positions
11:35 5 - ignores.earth.moves
12:50 6 - wording.translation.complex
13:55 7 - meanest.company.ever
15:36 make.maps.better
Sources and further reading
A useful general source of information on what3words is the OpenStreetMap Wiki entry on it wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/W...
For the accuracy in metres of a longitude/latitude measurement in degrees, see this wonderfully detailed answer gis.stackexchange.com/questio...
1 - uses.confusing.language
Vocabulary sizes: www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-4456...
2 - means.confusing.addresses
Andrew Tierney’s detailed blog reverse-engineering the what3words algorithm to expose why similar addresses appear near to one-another far more often than you’d expect at random cybergibbons.com/security-2/w...
Rescuers question what3words’ use in emergencies www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology...
what3words.com/employer.neatl... and what3words.com/employers.neat...
3 - offends.people.easily
This comment is a seemingly genuine complaint about the word ‘midgets’ being over someone’s home: shkspr.mobi/blog/2019/03/why-...
Using what3words for addresses
Chris Sheldrick’s TED Talk www.ted.com/talks/chris_sheld...
what3words blog on its use for addressing what3words.com/news/general/a...
4 - overlooks.vertical.positions
FAQ about how to deal with buildings with multiple floors support.what3words.com/en/art...
6 - ignores.earth.moves
Movement of different parts of Japan after the 2011 earthquake blogs.agu.org/mountainbeltway... www.gsi.go.jp/chibankansi/chi...
Australian Plate movement en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Austral...
Really interesting article on Australia’s grid update thanks to plate tectonics, and the UK’s own updated National Grid, known as OSGB36 www.ordnancesurvey.co.uk/news...
‘The current Number 10 started out life as Number 5, and was not renumbered until 1779.’ www.gov.uk/government/history...
7 - meanest.company.ever
What’s going on with WhatFreeWords? justpaste.it/39hat
Request to Twitter that it delete tweets referencing WhatFreeWords www.owenboswarva.com/misc/W3W...
Legal threat to security researcher Aaron Toponce in 2021: techcrunch.com/2021/04/30/wha...
Blog about just how intransparent what3words is blog.ldodds.com/2016/06/14/wh...
what3words accounts find-and-update.company-infor...
make.maps.better
Calculations behind my FourWordsFindWhere proposal docs.google.com/spreadsheets/...
Errata
At 12:09, anyway.nature.instance should be in Fukushima Prefecture, Japan, not near Brecon in Wales! (The earth didn’t move that far!)
Credits
Thanks so much to Huw James for filming this! Check out his tutorials for science filmmaking at www.sciencestorylab.co.uk
Thanks also to Tran Nguyen.
And finally…
Follow me on Twitter / statto
Follow me on Instagram / andrewjsteele
Like my page on Facebook / drandrewsteele
Read my book, Ageless: The new science of getting older without getting old ageless.link/
Stay safe wherever you are, kids! Some good advice for UK viewers is to register your phone to text 999 in case you find yourself with too little signal for calls or internet, but just enough to send a text. TEXT THE WORD ‘REGISTER’ TO 999. STOP WHAT YOU’RE DOING AND DO IT NOW! If anyone’s got any suggestions for tips in other parts of the world, please leave a comment below! And finally, anyone for whom a 17-minute KZhead video isn’t enough detail will enjoy security researcher Cybergibbons’ blog posts about the algorithmic issues with what3words: cybergibbons.com/security-2/why-what3words-is-not-suitable-for-safety-critical-applications/ (All other citations and further reading can of course be found in the video description.)
Just sent that text and got an automated reply that it was already registered. Good to know that I have that option
Thanks for the heads up on 999, and for presenting a complex topic in a very clear to understand way.
@@tonydotnottingham You’re welcome :)
Thanks..sooo much Didn't know that. Done it now:)
Lesser combination instead of 3m -> 57 trillion squares 5m -> 21 trillion squares with any no of word combinations 2~3 will be measurement vise more std.
A few technical/algorithmic points: W3W effectively translates bounded GPS coordinates into a dictionary of words. The problem is that the direct literal translation of GPS coordinates to the base-40000 corpus results in the weird combinations. Because there are 57 trillion combinations you can't just make this a simple database lookup, it requires a mathematical base conversion, that's the root of the problem. You can't just update a database to make a location less offensive or less confusing. A technical solution to this is to provide a "patch list" database of coordinates that resolve to a different word combination that is more unique or less offensive, but that patch list has to ensure there are no collisions. The W4W proposal has a couple more challenging issues. Aside from the words.in.inappropriate.order, which also requires a patch list (you will never have an algorithm that doesn't offend someone), you are changing the grid spacing over water. This requires a database of geofences to determine the difference between land and water, but more importantly it makes the algorithm non-orthogonal. You have to restart your base reference point in "water" zones because you cover 4x as much area for each address, if you simply continued the smaller grid over water then the approach is orthogonal, but you don't have enough words in the corpus to express all possible locations. A simpler approach would be to divide the globe into 4 quadrants (just like lat/lon has 4 quadrants), and prefix your location with the quadrant. Then you can have duplicate addresses but they are separated by 180 degrees, which is a simple way of de-conflicting addresses. That approach avoids geofences and orthogonality problems.
All good points, thanks! I am not a geo/mapping expert by any stretch, but when I did the calculations for 4WFW the grid size change made a big difference in terms of number of words, so it seemed potentially worth it? docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1wYEkseg1vbmkOzh-ZkuPHD2zn2vB5DvdXkOM-5Mnif8 w3w is geofenced too (it uses simpler words over more densely populated regions), so it’s not a disadvantage relative to that… Though you’re right, orthogonality would be nice! (As mentioned in response to another comment, being able to use an even number of words as a coordinate system is a potential advantage.) The way I’d make it offence-free is have few enough words that you can remove any with problematic connotations… As I said in the video, it probably wouldn’t remove all mildly hilarious ones, but I think you could do away with a lot of the issues! As @cavalrycome suggests, you could try using just nouns, which could be a good start. :)
@@DrAndrewSteele I guess the answer lies in the objective. Is the objective to provide a "lost and found" coordinate system or to provide a generalized location system? As you pointed out, any such system like W3W suffers from a lack of dimensionality. Therefore it seems that a short-code system is really only viable for lost+found type location mapping. Certainly a 5x5m grid is sufficient for lost+found, but if that's the objective, a larger area would work just as well. Make the grid 10mx10m and your calculations show an orthogonal algorithm would only need a ~1500 word corpus. If you break that up into quadrants, it reduces the amount to around 1063 words. If you allocate more words than necessary then you should have "spare" locations that don't conflict and you can replace offensive phrases with the nearest least offensive phrase. Say you allocate 1200 words and have 4 quadrants. For the purposes of search and rescue you don't even need a quadrant value, since you will be searching in a locality anyway. If this is something that interests you, create a Github repo to discuss this and have proof of concept code. Having a base-1200 corpus when only 1063 is needed is like having a sparse hash table. 1063 values will map to 1200, but you'll have some values that don't map, so those unused values become spares that can be used to replace offensive phrases. I think it might be a challenge to come up with 1200 simple nouns that translate from English into other Languages easily. Maybe the answer is to start with a non-English language and work backwards?
@@eformance Totally agree, it really does depend on the problem you’re trying to solve. 3×3 m seems not precise enough for addresses but so precise as to cause loads of problems, for example! 10×10 seems maybe a bit big for meeting someone in an urban environment? But even then, you’re not more than 7 metres or something away, and on average 3.5 or something, so maybe that’s the easiest solution…
I've been following W3W since its release although I have not used it extensively. The Four-Word option sounds very promising and I like the idea of eliminating plurals, etc. Very good analysis.
Great video Andrew and as a geospatial professional for 4 decades I understand and agree with everything you said relating to those topics you discussed, very well-articulated BTW! So, I'm a stickler about correct datums, coordinate systems, positional accuracy and I'm happy communicating in coordinates and decimal places, however; I also love W3W for exactly what it is actually great for, which you also pointed out, finding a discreet location that doesn't have a street address and passing it on to someone else so they can also identify that same square on the same or alternate mapping app - yes it has some idiosyncrasies, but man it has some great uses and people should give it go to see where it can be useful for their own situations. My 3 words to those who comment but haven't actually used it: "try.it.first". W3W does use, but doesn't require, GPS to get your location; the first of two differences to other addressing systems is the overlaid base-grid that happens to provide the second difference, an alternative to an 'address' where there isn't one. If you happen to know where you roughly are, want to be, or looking for, just open the W3W app and move the basemap or photomap with your...well...digit. It's perfect for providing a location to someone for them to navigate to, e.g. I've sent one to my son showing the exact carpark space (yes outdoor) where I left his car for him to collect - I didn't care what the 3 words were, didn't have to, neither did he. Whether you're at the beach, in the park or trying to relay or find the location of a shack in a shanty town, or the entrance gate to a property, especially very large ones, W3W is perfect for that - just not everything - find your own uses for it, "be.pleasantly.surprised". In Australia, we have a great emergency services app, Emergency Plus, which provides your location in multiple forms as soon as you open it, including street address, Lat/Long, your location on a basemap, and you guessed it, W3W. Plenty of accurate information for the emergency services responder - if they get it wrong from there, it's their fault.
Like any system there will be shortcomings. As another poster stated, you are unlikely to use this as a way to identify somewhere in a high rise. In that case you would use the regular postal address but it is useful to identify which entrance of that high rise you should meet at. The argument that the words might be confused if calling on a bad line is true, but is also equally true for trying to read a string of numbers for a GPS coordinate.
What I learned mostly from this video is the need to communicate the 3 word address PERFECTLY, and verify that the rescue crew reads it back exactly correct. In an emergency situation I could care less if my 3 word location consists of the 3 most offensive words ever created!
Yes...and think of needing to get the 14-16 digits plus decimals and +/- of GPS exact. In at least 90% of situations I bet the 3 words win out.
They are just chance combinations. You might as well worry about rude shapes in the clouds.
I feel like the odds of miscommunicating a word is no different to the odds of mixing up digits in a coordinate.
No one in uk uses latitude and longitude. You use an OS grid reference which is 6 digits for 100sq meters. Not 20 digits. Easy. There’s even an app for your phone so the youth of today need not panic.
Well said John, clear comms is key when using this app. (Gary B).
I always liked the elegance of what3words, because three words and three by three meters and the fact that it checks out mathematically. I was wondering how they would make sure there wouldn’t be any collisions between similar-sounding words (I noticed for example that ‘roll’ and ‘role’ both don’t occur in the database), but it turns out they don’t. I love your idea of a four-word-based system. Here are my suggestions and points of discussion. • First, make the squares 4×4 metres, for elegance with a 4-word naming system. • The vocabulary for B2 (as you want to keep it accessible) is in the order of 4000 words. With a deliberately chosen subset, it must be possible to cover all these squares and make them as unambiguously translatable as possible (though you _will_ run into problems because easy words in one language aren’t easy words in another per se, so this may not be a desirable goal). • What map projection? Mercator would be naïve and optimised for the poles, but something like the brand-new Cupola projection for minimal overall distortion may be a better idea. • Double colon as a prefix. This is a style choice. What3words uses a triple-slash, and two colons are four dots (symbolises four words). Just for fun. • As a separator, I was inclined to say the hyphen, but this may become problematic in other languages where hyphens play a bigger role in spelling. Something like (+) ( , ) (&) or ( ; ) would be possible too, as long as it’s easy to pronounce in a lot of languages. Then the (+) and (&) would be best since the word for ‘and’ is short in every language. • Don’t bother about sea borders. It would make the algorithm needlessly complicated. • Most important is the shuffle function. I’d say, make it a simple gradual counting system like GPS. Not anything fancy pseudorandom like what3words does. Say you’d reserve the first and second words for rough x and y coordinates, and the third and fourth for the precise x and y subdivisions. Even with GPS inaccuracies, you’d still get the first two words right. This way, you can choose words that always need to be far apart from each other (like similar words, or certain words that should be separated because they are offensive together). The greatest advantage is that close places have similar names. Furthermore, you’re guaranteed to not have accidental collisions because of the lack of pseudorandomness. I hope this is enough food for thought. You made a terrific video with clever jokes. Especially the Australian addresses were brilliantly found. Keep it up!
I am four this proposal (Seriously though, some cool ideas here!)
@@DrAndrewSteele Maybe Four words and 4x4 squares?
Very high quality video, loved the cheeky digs with the 3 word locations
Thanks!
Your suggestions sound like a good idea! A very well constructed and thought provoking video, thanks for making it!
Thank you!
What I learned mostly from your video is that if I am lost, I need to VERY accurately communicate my 3 word location, and verify that the emergency crew reads it back absolutely correct. In an emergency situation I could care less how offensive the words might be to me or anyone else!!
Sorry for being a knobhead but, Surely you couldn't care less.
A couple of extra bits - smart phones that have GPS (needed for W3W to work) should already send your location automatically when calling emergency services, avoiding *any* words or mistakes. But even when not, a simple SMS of a URL can allow your location to be passed automatically with even poor signal coverage, again avoiding any words - a system some search and rescue that are not on emergency services numbers already use. Finally the T&Cs for W3W actually say to read and understand all of the T&Cs before use, and check them before each use, wasting a lot of valuable time if you actually follow the terms they have set. Oh, and they also say they cannot be used where the use could conceivably lead to loss of life, something that could apply in any emergency use situation. They also say you must not rely on their products, that is part of their terms too!
Wow, great find! (You read the T&Cs?! :) ) I can see why they want to cover themselves here, but it does seem pretty amazing that their own advertising strategy directly contradicts their own terms of use… And check them before each use is hilarious…whatRead4000wordsThenSay3words doesn’t quite have the same ring to it…
I quite agree! The first time I heard about w3w I thought, as my son would say -'wait, what?!, you have to use your GPS smart phone to run and app to get 3 words communicate your location?'
Of course they’re going to use standard language to cover them selves legally. Everyone does.
Yes, the app uses the limited accuracy of your phone’s GPS to determine the closest set of words assigned by W3W. Three words which are easier to convey and comprehend than the standard Lat-Long coordinates.
First time viewer, and man, I gotta say this is so incredibly well written, filmed and edited. Kudos to you! Am subscribing!
Thank you!
Also, what gets me is people manage to read 16 digit credit card numbers when ordering a curry and that works, so actually reading a numeric location with a bit of spacing and a check digit is not that hard, honest.
I use w3w every day. It can make finding rural places far eaiser than using just a postcode or address based on "random cottage name". It is not perfect but a lot better than not having it. I think they need to keep up the good work.
You make some great points in a informed and interesting way. In addition I believe there are lots of homophones which when said could be spelt differently and provide a different location. Read/ Reed; bread/bred for example
Yes, I mention those in the video! My favourite word pair in w3w is incompetents/incompetence…
To be offended by a randomly (in effect) generated permutation of words makes about as much sense as to choose to be offended by a rude shape in the clouds. Also, let's not forget that, just as beauty is in in the eye of the beholder, offensiveness is in the mind of the beholder. The "offensiveness" is not in the phrase itself. It only exists as a result of someone choosing to be offended (or since that isn't operationally defined, better to say, "claiming to be offended").
Well said, completely agree! Also the examples given in the video would not seem offensive to anyone who has a 'clean' mind...
@@stepheneyles2198 You might as well look in a table of random numbers and complain that 666 is there. Or look at a long book and complain that one of page numbers in 666.
100% agree! Offense is in the mind of the beholder. It’s random, make a joke of it so you remember it better. 99.99% of the world will not know it exists. And fewer will care.
Just got an ad on KZhead India about this.. wanted to know more about it. Thanks for putting out practical challenges 😄
Glad to be of service!
I did not know about this. Thank you for a great video!
Found your channel with this video, stunning quality. Next vsauce or veritas I'm no cap. Keep at it man. here before 5k subs.
Another problem with having a private company in charge of a system like this is competition. The concept is simple enough to copy and using the patent to prevent copycats will only go so far. It won't be enforceable in some parts of the world and it doesn't last forever. Much like bitcoin, if there's profit to be made then there will be copycats and spinoffs. And then you need to know which system the rescue service you have called is using and download the right app to match. A free and open, globally agreed system has no profit, and therefore no incentive to spin your own version off.
Good point too! Closed-source solutions cause so many problems…
"globally-agreed" is the tricky bit. There are already many open-source attempts at reducing the complexity of geographic coordinates, but none of them has emerged as the clear winner.
Good god. We can't even get a 'globally agreed system' to agree on having the same emergency number... such as 999 or 911. Some even use different numbers to call fire vs police vs. medical. Bottom line... if you don't like W3W.... don't use it or recommend it. Same goes for the other choices that people insist on complaining about, such as the evil Google, the evil Amazon, the evil Facebook (Meta). If you don't like it.... don't use it... and sell your stock in the company.
I've heard of a couple of these things listed as problems with the w3w service before, but never put together in such an intuitive way. Stunning video Andrew.
Thank you! Glad to be of service :)
I think I've just found the next tom scott, brilliant video!!!!
This is a sensationally shot, and edited video... well done.
Thanks! Huge credit to Huw James who was behind the camera!
But still the idea behind what3words is absolutely brilliant and I loved it tho.🔥👍
Having worked on the 999 emergency line some ten years ago we were then able to get the Northings and Eastings for mobile phones instantly. This would back then allow us to locate a phone within approximately 25 metres. If it was critical and indoors we could then get the subscriber details from the provider or pinpoint the phone to within a few feet.
Bizarrely, the one time I called 999 in the last few years the operator didn’t even know which TOWN I was in! I told them which street I was on and they were like ‘slow down, XXX street, which town?’ I thought the auto-location thing had been deployed universally but apparently not! Glad to hear it works at least somewhere though, and great to hear from someone who’s actually dealt with 999 calls :)
@@DrAndrewSteele cheers for the response. That is odd. As I stated it is ten years since I worked there so things might have changed. However, as I can not see technology becoming less effective I have to suspect that you connected with someone who did not know their job. That’s not ideal when the 999 service is literally contacting them is more often than not a life or death situation.
@@deanwal1962 Thankfully that one wasn’t life or death! But yeah, it would be odd if things had gone backwards. Here’s hoping the tech and training for new operators has solved this by now. :)
You need the permission of the caller for this to work. Once mountain rescue phone you they ask permission.
No we didn’t. However, it may be different for Mountain Rescue. Back when I worked for BT we (999 Operators) only routed calls to the Fire, Police, Ambulance and very occasionally to the Coastguard. If I recall correctly calls requiring Mountain Rescue went through to the Police. Once through to the I am almost certain that we were required to pass on the Northings and Eastings.
Such an underrated channel! So much quality content and hardwork, better than many cliched mainstream channels. Hope u get what you deserve :)
Thank you, that’s very kind :)
Obviously, you don't know that MRT's use OS National Grid References in the UK, not Lat Lon, that's for adding your confusion in!..... W3W does have its benefits if the user is on a roaming call some info is better than none as MRT's can't call them back. Also if you have the wrong location autosuggest that W3W supply is a great benefit. I have criticised W3W before, now I have a better understanding. It's a tool in the toolbox to benefit emergency services
Love your 4-word idea. When do you complete your business plan? I want shares!!
Id say use 4 words, but keep the 3x3m for the land, and make 9x9 for the ocean. However, make them 3x3x3m upto a certain hight where it makes no sense, like the top of everest (but keep the ocean 2D cus it's the ocean) Or we could adjust how many height words are given depending on the geography (and buildings) of the area. It might be a headache to implement, but it would help convey far more information about your location. Like if youre stuck on a bridge or in a tree.
The only issue is: if you add a third dimension at 3 m resolution, you’re going to need LOADS more words!!
...and can't say, I'm up a tree? I think the bridge would be self-explanatory...same with the mountainside.
If the exact three word square your on has confusing words, just tap near ones that are easier to read out!!! Youll still get found!! Jeeze!
You can now add the longitude and latitude cords under the three words in the new update. It can help in an emergency.
Big fan of w3w for many years. You opened my eyes.
This is a great piece of work. As stated here, w3w is in many languages. A few years ago, this was 13 languages and that was enough of a problem and when it had grown to over 40 they still boasted about it on the website as though it was a positive aspect. Now that there are over 50, the number of languages does not seem to feature as something to boast about. So which language should be used in an emergency? The language of the sender or the language of the recipient? Once you take into account the different languages and the lemmas, w3w collapses to a system using an unpredictable number of characters from about 12 to 25 to define an impractically small area. The British postcode system is one of the most accurate specialist postal coding systems in the world. It can define a single building but more often part of a street that is maybe 100m across. Sometimes, in rural areas, it defines an area 10km across that has only one or two delivery addresses in it. Like w3w, it is a proprietary system and no comprehensive hard copy mapping is available. (Worse still, it is slowly changing all the time.) Most postal coding systems around the world are far less accurate. What this means is that a useful, and possibly hugely improved, addressing code can be achieved with a far smaller number of characters than w3w without all of the problems of multiple languages and without the problems of a proprietary system. Consider a possible alternative. VG895921 is an six-figure MGRS grid reference with code letters that defines a 100m x 100m square (similar size to a British postcode). 30V VG895921 defines it uniquely (it is a point within the UK) but VG895921 does not repeat for several hundred kilometres and so is unique within most nation states around the world in which it occurs. This system covers the entire world. Adding a further two digits defines a 10m x 10m square. It is open source and appears on the civil mapping systems of some countries and the mapping of many military organisations. It is a blend of the UTM grid with sets of 100km squares imposed upon it in the same manner as a British OS Grid Reference. NOTE: 1. British OS Grid Reference is the preferred positioning system for Land SAR operations in Great Britain. 2. In over 50 countries around the world, most mobile phones automatically send your lat-long location in an AML data stream alongside your emergency call or SMS. Enable AML/ELS, stay on the line for >30s. 75% success for UK mobile 999/112. See EENA website for more information. 3. MGRS is Military Grid Reference System and is sometimes called USNG or United States National Grid in the USA. 4. UTM is Universal Transverse Mercator and is routinely used for civilian mapping in several countries.
Have you ever tried to explain the military grid positioning system to a hiker who is I’ll prepared and has no idea how to explain where they are. Maybe great for military talking to each other but Joe Public have no idea and want something simple. Easy to tell someone to download the App and text or read out their position. A 10 yo kid could do it, that’s the point.
@@McGoldbug There are apps to download for other positioning systems as well. I have apps for British OS Grid, Lat-Long, MGRS and UTM. In systems like OS Grid or MGRS, using 6 digits positions you to within 100m, which is good enough for most emergency purposes, and is unique with a 100km square. The reason MGRS uses that approach is because during WW2 allies noticed that the British were more effective because their grid reference system meant that they were more likely to know where they were and where they were going. The British had been using their earlier Cassini grid, or Modified British System. You refer to 'Joe Public' but in WW2 that is exactly who made up the 3 million men of the British Army and made such good use of the grid reference system.
Another problem I see with it are the square system itself. My house has one address, it has also 1 specific address code (Eircode in Ireland) but it has 27 w3w combinations. Imagine an emergency situation at a mall or so. Emergency services would get multiple contacts but with different combinations and they would have to translate them and then collate to know that they already dispatched a response to it. Your 4 easier words list sounds better but the final list should be going through accent screening, especially involving foreigners that aren't native speakers.
Good point! Even quite small properties have multiple addresses. See also the w3w HQ address…
I overcame that by selecting the w3w code for my front door grid. My house is a stand-alone residence, there are three w3w codes from the footpath kerb on the street to my front door, so saving the grid in which my front door is located gives emergency services, postal, delivery, etc an exact location.
Well said Ray, Greg - you say your property is covered by 27 squares but you're happy with just the one address for your property, so imagine when the emergency crew arrive at your address, they then have to find their way in and find you somewhere on that property. At your disposal now, you have 27 pin point areas you could tell them exactly where to find you by. You could pin point exactly which gate to enter etc (should that be necessary for them to know). As for the point about multiple calls from different locations in a mall - I think people are forgetting that you don't just ring the emergency centre and say 'Fire at town.chair.lift' for example and then put the phone down leaving them wondering if this call could be related to the last one they had, they talk to you and confirm where the location is, they will not think there are fires all over the place as you are suggesting.
The end comment about hopelessly lost is a bit harsh. Compare it to what has gone before, map, street alas and sat nav and without doubt it is easier and more accurate to use. Many people cannot read a map, lots cannot read a street atlas, which like a sat nav is no good in the mountains away from roads. I am not saying W3W is perfect but let us appreciate what it is and hopefully, help it improve.
My problem is that it explicitly excludes geographical relationships (I know that I am on a trail but don't know how far I progressed. I may have passed through all sorts of w3w addresses, no way I can tell only 2 of those that stayed constant during my hike). I also may not know my precise location (due to being in a gorge in southern France for example where GPS precision drops significantly) I would want to be able to give a less precise address without the implication that I know where I am within those 3 meters... Due to reflections off the gorges walls I may be several 100 meters off in any direction. With GPS I can use the number of digits I pass on to the rescuers to imply a precision, instead of giving 6 digits after the decimal point I can give 4 digits, thereby widening the search area but the rescuers will know that lack of precision and come prepared...
Both very good points! Representing uncertainty is particularly hard in a words-based system…maybe you could somehow cleverly encode it into the words but that might make it even worse at geographical relationships! Hmm.
Computational linguist here. It could be good to limit the words to just nouns so that you can't accidentally make sentences that mean potentially offensive things. I also wonder if it would be possible to make use of some characteristics of the words that are not being used in the system you describe, like which letter they begin with to indicate things like height or to indicate the larger geographic area the square belongs to. For instance, having person.man.woman.television and papa.meat.witch.tan both belong to an larger area designated p.m.w.t (from the first letters of each word). This would allow rescue workers to at least narrow things down if the words weren't heard correctly for example. Just thinking out loud.
Great idea! And great example hahaha It’s also potentially part of another good argument for four-word addresses which I cut for space reasons: having an even number of words allows you to use them as x/y coordinates, so p.m could be a large latitude-ish square and w.t a large longitude-ish one.
@@DrAndrewSteele Yes, that would be even better!
2 letters gives you a division about half a degree when applied naively. Would there be an advantage to a structured ordering that repeats around the globe so a.b.c.d is for example a ~5x5km area inside a larger ~3000x3000km area? So locally just the letters tell you a general place that is not globally unique but is still decently specific if you are free to make an assumption about where the call came from. Then the full 4 words would still be globally unique and specify a more exact location. Knowing places near you all start with similar letters may help filter some really absurd but similar sounding word locations, but if all the words near me start with b.c or b.d for a degree of distance that might make hearing things even harder.
You could still get "offensive" phrases with only nouns. But why worry about it? You might as well worry about rude shapes in the clouds.
I wasn't aware there is a law against criticism.
may be it is US only…
Isn't the first amendment free speech?@@SD_Alias
I've used w3w since its release. I use it as a driving app with Google maps. Found it better than just Google maps all round. The issues on this video aren't going to apply to the vast majority of users. I don't plan on going to Alaska any time soon.
The larger the list of words, the more precise the address can be, coupled by how many words you use. Sure, you can simplify the amount of words used by making the squares bigger, but then the mapping system won’t be as precise. It depends on what you plan to use it for, even geocoordinates can be bigger areas if you use less digits.
Nice informative video man, good job !
Thank you!
i think the translation problem is hopeless and not even worth pursuing: there will never be enough words that can be translated into several different languages at once, specially if you want extra "safety features", first because, by the very nature, words need context and can change A LOT (between languages, location in the "sentece" - changing even the pronunciation!), and translators may not agree (and given the amount of cases, will definitely not) on the proper translation... well, just pick one and be done? most often it'll work, but we're talking about MANY situations where things could go wrong and a lot of people can get angry... then what? change it, but can you guarantee the new combination isnt of somewhere else already? can you guarantee this "embarassement" wont happen again? im not just talking about translation problems anymore, of course
You might well be right! I think it would be interesting to see how far you can get, but it may be far fewer than 1800 words before problems start to crop up… :)
This was super useful! I was able to turn your video into a ESL mini plan! thank you! 🙏
Lovely to hear that it can be put to some educational use! :)
I think what3words has limitations but it is excellent for places without an address. If you were to call emergency services for a problem of floor 10 of a building most people would have no trouble using the address i.e. floor 10 London House High Street Blanktown. Indeed if the address is known you would not need what3words. But in places you do not know where you are or do not have an address it would work fine and certainly a lot better than co-ordinates. It would seem unlikely people in rural Russia would use English words whether offensive or not. Stuck on a mountain would you care if the 3 words might make an offensive phrase? No.
It is massively worse than co-ordinates for emergency services. If you can use W3W, you can use any number of SAR designed location systems - which are not only more accurate (8 decimal place UTM is standard) - they are heirarchal (an incorrect UTM location will still point us in the right direction - whilst a W3W location will send us the complete wrong way) and most importantly - they tell us how accurate the co-ordinates are - say you have poor tracking due to a low quality GPS antenna in your device, or limited overhead sattelites, or obstructed path to sattelites, your GPS coordinates can often show areas several kilometres in size - a W3W location will just pick the centre of that HUGE area and say you're there - a proper location system will tell us how big the margin of error is. W3W is a stillborn concept - and it being advertised in the public safety role is an example of venture capital placing start up dollars above human life.
I wouldn't care if it made an offensive phrase. Period.
Next level content quality, the drone shot was epic
Thank you! All credit to my pilot, Huw!
these feel like nitpicks. We can find flaws like this in any mapping system. And yes i would be mad if i dont want to be an open source company but someone figures out a way to recreate my code. Nice video tho love the location 🔥
Yes, very much nitpicky. I wonder how much research was needed to find those rude combinations and he definitely tried to make What Tree Words more complicated than it actually is.
A couple of the problems are a tad embellished as well. In their own material it says to use W3W as an extra address, not as a replacement (for places with existing addresses). If a highrise is at 314 Belich Drive, then you will obviously add "Apt 202". To state this is only a problem with W3W is a false equivalence. The Confusing Language problem is already addressed. Whenever you type an address, it populates a list of similar places to choose from to make sure I choose the right one.
If there were 2 or 4 redundant but still random 4-word combinations per location (just overland or just populated areas) it would make it almost certain that no one was foced to give out an address they found offensive.
amazing videographic production and engineering content!
Thank you!
Today I learned about what3words, and its flaws! Great video
I was having trouble wrapping my head around the benefit of W3W. It seemed the only difference between sharing your location with W3W vs sharing your location with traditional maps is if you are trying to describe your location over the phone, something I would never do. Whether your location is being shared via an app, or from something like the emergency feature in an Apple Watch, the receiving party simply gets a clickable link. When an emergency situation is happening, I prefer to use an app called “Parachute” because in an emergency their is a lot more useful details it will gather for you then just your location. If you were in a location with no cell signal, you would not be able to communicate your position using any method. I do like the idea of your suggestions, but for me personally, if you are under duress, or have an emergency, the last thing you need to be thinking about is “which app to use”
If you don't like your W3W address, just pick an adjacent square, with almost no loss of accuracy.
Did what3words not have a UX team that tested and reiterated upon findings such as yours? And more importantly why have they not hired you??
You perfectly and thoroughly explained what I felt just as a subconscious distrust. Well done video!
I used it to save some nice photo locations or tell my buddy where i am with my fishing gear and tell him so easily my location which has no address. It worked fine. I understand the problems that can occur, but so far they have never affected me or occurred. The 3 words with a literal description of the location are then even safer. So for my needs it is working good… The 4 words option and bigger squares sounds good for me and should be considered. Who needs 3meter accuracy? even 20meter would be exact enough.
If you can talk to the person can't you just send a text with the words?
Excellent video. Thanks Andrew.
Thanks Graham!
What about multi-level addressing? That issue with the HQ of the company -- does that square mean on or under the motorway? The wrong level may mean life or death in a rescue situation. What about tectonic or glacial movement? Some places can move more than a meter during an earthquake.
some as important as this should have some sort of international standard (like ISO) and not left to commercial companies as the gatekeepers.
Totally agree!
I totally agree with you 5m on land and 10m on sea, extra words add to it or even numbers. You pointed out the things could be improve for better purpose. Can't argue with corporate wants to make $$, the world is going mad.
Nice edited video. Helpful to
@DrAndrewSteele This is a good explanation of the drawbacks of W3W, generally it works ok, but you've explained the negatives very well. I agree that larger squares or 4 words could be better. Great vid.
Thank you! :)
what if we were to have a Number+word+word+word system? (Find4Corners maybee?) So it can start with : 1. (# of the country code): This way we'll know which country right away 2. (Direction markers [N/S/E/W/etc..]) :By sectioning this allows at least some sort of a general idea for emergency rescue service to begin 3 + 4. With the 2 steps above, now we can cut the amount uneccesary words by eliminating homonyms and plurals this would requires an opensourced effort for sure, but i think it's a viable step up from what3wrods
I think there's a problem with using a country code: disputed areas like Kashmir or Kosovo. You can assign the territory their own code but the countries that felt the land is rightfully theirs would object
If you are at home you can find more than one addreess depending on where you are in the room, if one address offends you , move a little to the left or right and find a different address. I feel this is very picky. I guess it has to be given its question of what is wrong. I am sure that if I phoned for help I would want to be sure that my position was known by spelling the words as well. I think it will be a while before WTW is used as the sole means of giving an address. It is a bit like going into the mountains relying on sat nav without a map and compass to fall back on. WTW is a potentially extra safety tool.
This is a brilliant video, really interesting and entertaining
Many thanks!
I am a surveyor to trade and think this is a great video
Thanks!
Rab is great. I love their shorts
Great video, keep it up!
Thank you, I’ll try! :)
It always has around 60 miles of inaccuracy for my phone.
I don't see how the 4 word option will overcome the shifting tectonic plates or the vertical positioning "problems" that are mentioned. Not even the current GPS system overcomes these two issues. Also, is it perceived that the 4 words option will be translatable into other languages? Or will it again, be anglicised?
Even translating is not that simple. There are multiple translations for the same word in different languages, there are different meanings for the same words etc. You end up having a database for map positions' translations in most languages for making it bullet proof. Open source is the only one I would want this system to be, not belonging to some company who decides where is everything, all by itself. But, if you ask me, this comes too late. In a few years / a decade, maybe two, technology will make this redundant. Some device can easily send a GPS location without messing the numbers of the coordonates, spelling them might not be needed.
You can also find similarly 'offensive' terms in a dictionary, this is why we have context and nuance.
People don’t live or worship in dictionaries
Ur so underrated I thought I was watching a KZheadr with a million subs
Haha thank you!
I think one of the problems is also the absence of hierarchical information in w3w. In classical geo coordinates, the more digits the more accuracy and closer numbers is an indication of the level of proximity, this is totally lacking in w3w. Maybe the fourth word could be used to indicate a grid zone?
Yes, that seems like a sensible addition! Another possible feature with four words is that both coordinates could be hierarchical because 4 divides into 2!
Your points are all valid. W3W is a one trick pony. All it does is provide your position. It cannot be used for navigation and there is no sense of proximity between 2 positions as mentioned above. Also you mention latitude and longitude as the alternative. In reality in the UK it’s the OS grid which is a lot easier to grasp and communicate than full blown lat/long. 6 digits gives you 100 square meters which is more than accurate enough when you’re in the mountains.
This is an excellent video which tells us a lot about W3W, thank you for researching and putting it together :) I've had concerns about W3W since our company started using it to specify the location of our multiple sites throughout the UK. 1) If the W3W company goes bust (which the figures you quoted in the video demonstrate may be sooner rather than later) then the whole system will fall apart and become useless. All time put aside to allocating addresses, making or revising signs, adding to databases etc. by numerous companies throughout the world will have been wasted. 2) What happens near the poles? How can 3-meter squares evenly cover a spherical object? There must be some interesting 'effects', shall we say, as you go further North/South. I could go on but for fear of legal action I will pause for now!
I have seen on the national news of people being rescued using what 3 words app which is great proving it does work and a useful app. I use it alot and really like the app and easy to use and share. If you share your location there is no mix up words and just click on it and automatically shows you the location.. Friends and family use it to show and share where they are when travelling the world which makes you so involved with their travels which is so great. There is nothing that is ever completely perfect and always someone willing to find faults cause it was not their invention. Everyone has their own opinion and mine is I like what 3 words very much.
Here’s another story on the national news for you: www.bbc.com/news/technology-57156797 It’s also made rescues more difficult!
Great video! Thanks!
6:28 how much time and effort to find this pair of nearby combinations?
Not much, my computer did it for me :)
How does W3W deconflict with actual place names? For example it would be pretty weird if "White. House. Lawn." wasn't Infront of the President's mansion, or if "Sugar. Loaf. Mountain." wasn't in Rio De Janerio. I guess you could exclude words that are common to traditional place name constructions, but that must have a pretty sizeable impact on your pool of vocabulary to draw from.
Hahaha, great point! what3words.com/sugar.loaf.mountain is in Iran! And sadly ‘white’ is not a w3w word, but the Cold War evidently continues because the Russians have a what3words.com/whiter.house.lawn …
@@DrAndrewSteele There is a Sugarloaf Mountain in Maine, USA
@@DrAndrewSteele sugar.loaf.mountain seems to be a fire station in Iran. However, cute as that may be, I think it makes no difference to the goal of what3words. Other than making clever KZhead videos possible, in practice, who cares?
There is a Sugar Loaf Mountain near Starvation Peak near Las Vegas, New Mexico USA
Platetectonics means that your neat system breaks down, when land.moves.ocean, as the distinction of land and water literally moves.
Yes it's not perfect, but it's far better than not having it. As for the 'offensive' word combinations, you're not supposed to take offence where none is intended.
Great presentation. Sorry to be so old-fashioned but I see nothing wrong with the Ordnance Survey grid reference system. Easy to use and understand if you are sensible enough to take a proper map with you when walking in the Brecon Beacons or anywhere else for that matter. It's even easier with a smart phone to tell you exactly where you are with either OS or GPS coordinates. If you're worried about your battery dying to either check your position or contact emergency services you can just go back to the tried and tested use of compass, whistle, flashlight and common sense of always checking exactly where you are as you go along before you get into trouble. I have to wonder how many outdoor enthusiasts know how to do that nowadays. Alternatively carry a separate small battery bank to be used only in emergency to keep your phone working. And remember, there's not always a phone signal when you need it, especially in remote locations. I've come across people lost because of lack of a map, compass and phone signal. We certainly seem to be living in a time of dumbing down where intelligence counts for nothing.
Exactly right!
Spot on. The hype around W3W as some great new thing is strange given the OS have been doing it for years and even have a free app( OS locate)!
Not sure designating the world and all of the squares English language would be a very smart move
Not perfect no, but what is, it’s still generally useful.
Trivial points when compared to LatLong. Clearly he has never been involved in search and rescue (S&R) Rather have 3 words that are a little bit out than nothing. S&R can always play with different combinations of spellings and plurals etc to find a square in the search area. Wrong spellings usually come out on opposite side of the globe so easily ruled out. Police helicopters use it all the time to advise ground crews of locations of missing persons, etc. Seriously have you ever tried to get LatLong from a novice hiker, near impossible. Police, Ambos’ and Firies are using it regularly in their patrol dispatch. Trust their judgement rather than Andrew Steele, who is he anyway?
When we (MRT) get a W3W location passed to us by the police/controller, they also highlight any similar sounding locations nearby and some of them are within 20 miles.
Look, Andrew, I appreciate this content and really enjoyed your video! You make some great points and I just found out about this from my dash cam. I understand your "concern" with the insensitive combinations and foreign translations, but all I can say is one should just move over 3 meters and dry up his/her oversensitive tear ducts! My response to those oversensitive users would be: GROW/UP/SNOWFLAKE !!! (I censored my 3 words choice here, believe me!)
Superb analysis.
Thanks!
Great content
What if you use a series of 50 symbols to name an address? Like a base-50 system? How many symbols would you need?
You would need 9 symbols in order to have at least 57 trillion possibilities (assuming you go with the 3m x 3m squares that what3words uses). You would actually have about 1,953 trillion possibilities. But if you drop back to 8 symbols you would only have about 39 trillion possibilities. The math is "50 raised to the X power" where X is the number of symbols/digits.
@@neilevans6965 Good math. I guess that words are the simplest way to make a unique identifier.
I broke down on the motorway. Calls insurance, could barely hear them for the sound of trucks. They insisted I download this P.O.S app. My GPS / 5g etc is always on by default. All I got was a blank white screen showing a dot & no way of telling me where I was. No button to locate me. I've avoided this app by my own intuition up to this point & it looks like I was right. After uninstalling it, they then proceeded to spam me to death for a few weeks. Bogus behaviour. Dodgy data collecting company. Download a simple grid reference app instead.
Wow, what a terrible experience. Add those issues to the list!
57 followed by 12 zeros is known to many in this little planet as 57 millions of million or 57 billions . I know some countries call a billion the 1 followed by 9 zeros and others call a billion the 1 followed by 12, I am not looking to antagonize, just wanted to highlight that semantic can be confusing sometimes. Also, please note that what3words is available in more than 50 languages, so if English is not your native language you still have the chance that yours is included. In fact, the app asks you when setting it up which language you want to use. Peace
Good Information Liked
A more dynamic/expressive banlist would help.
Brilliant. Video. Andrew.
Thank you! :)
So all it need is a text message and not a phone call.
Hope you never make any mistakes or get autocorrected while texting!
Great info.
FOSS and a collaborative effort make sense. To use the “squares” in remote places as some sort of address makes no sense to me since that is not how people live. It would also be better to coordinate the grid with the existing ones expressed in latitude and longitude. Since one second of latitude and longitude is about an 80 foot square and a five meter square is a much smaller unit the final size of the smaller unit should fall into the larger one. The 3 or four word value could represent the larger unit, with a repeating sequence for each smaller subunit. This would in effect make it a four or five word thing unless the 5th were just a number or a single letter. Universal systems like these should not be patent-able. However, the persons involved with first setting it up deserve some sort of compensation.
I think what free words is great. I get these limitations, but for ease and being able to copy and paste, text the words make up for some of the downfalls. Oh and please don't give them something else to moan about, they are just words that didn't get put together to offend.
Yes you are obviously a very clever young man, and you made some valid points, however if I was ever in a situation that I needed help but hadn’t a clue where I actually was, (happens more and more these days), I don’t think that I would be troubled by some “politically incorrect” “what3words”! I appreciate that the exact what3words need to transmitted. So until someone comes up with a better solution, my vote goes to what3words.
Wondering what (famed linguist) Noam Chomsky might think of w3w approach
He might think it’s transformational.
Nice work thx